


Family, Made by Hand

by LectorEl



Series: Made by Hand [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Don't answer that, F/M, Janet lives a more interesting life than anyone would suspect, What Was I Thinking?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-31
Updated: 2012-10-31
Packaged: 2017-11-17 11:06:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/550892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LectorEl/pseuds/LectorEl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Janet Drake followed her father into the CIA. Within a year, she meets Slade while out on assignment and that's when everything changed for her. Flash forward a while, Slade and Wintergreen have known Janie for years. But this is the first time they've met her son. Somebody's started targeting Janie's carefully hidden civilian identity, and they had the bad taste to go after her son. You almost have to feel sorry for them. Janie's got her sniper rifle, and Slade's got her back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: Janet

**Author's Note:**

> For the DCU_Bang. Gypsydancergirl made an amazing piece of art to accompany this. Check it out over [here](http://gypsydancergirl.livejournal.com/40738.html).  
> I also made a character soundtrack for Janet while in the process of writing this, which you can download [here](http://lectorel.tumblr.com/post/29611796860/since-she-and-peizhi-are-eating-my-brain-these).

The infant who would one day become Janet Drake entered the world uncelebrated one cold January morning in the early sixties. The birth announcement in the Washington, D.C. newspaper listed her as Janet Lynn Finch, the daughter of Melissa Finch, nee Owens, a housewife and homemaker, and Daniel Finch, a data analyst working a local shipping company. 

In truth, Daniel analyzed an entirely different kind of data for the CIA. He was a pragmatic man, cool and removed from the events of his life. His marriage was as much a matter of strategy as every other part of his life. 

As much as his daughter’s own birth was a matter of strategy. Daniel held his daughter once, passed her back to her mother, and didn't look at her again until his wife, quite unexpectedly, passed away. Melissa died in April, four years and three months after her daughter was born. 

The funeral was the first time Janet could ever remember seeing her father, an impossibly thin giant with frightening blue eyes.

"Janet," the man that she’d been told to call Father said.

"Yes, sir?" Janet asked, clenching her fist in the skirt of her black dress to keep from crying. She wanted her _momma_. The man opened his mouth, and closed it again. He shook his head.

"You'll be coming in with me to work until I find an appropriate caretaker. I expect you to behave. No running, no shouting, and no bothering people. You're a big girl, and you should behave like one." He patted Janet's shoulder awkwardly.

Janet nodded stiffly, uncomfortable with the man’s touch. "Yes, sir." And that was how Janet came to spend her days among the offices of the CIA, watched haphazardly by the secretaries and errand boys. The arrangement worked well enough for her father, and he never did find someone to care for Janet. 

Janet spent her childhood haunting the hallways, listening in on conversations no child should hear, peeping into files to see things most grown adults would not be able to stomach. She grew, as neglected children are wont to do, into an angry, untrusting young woman, unloving and unloved. 

Her father died when Janet was seventeen, leaving her the house, some small savings, and the security clearance she had been granted. With little else that interested her, Janet drifted into service with the CIA. She proved to have an aptitude for field work, and by her nineteenth birthday, was cleared to complete solo missions.

It was in South America that Janet met the man who would change her life.

Janet felt the rifle jerk against her shoulder, and swore as her shot barely grazed her target. The man startled, falling to the floor. Within moments, before Janet could even try for a second shot, his security hustled him inside. Janet swore again, and started hastily packing up. Marco Guiliano lived to see another day, but Janet wouldn't if she didn't get out of here before the police and private guards traced the shot back to its origin.

"That was a _terrible_ shot, kid."

Janet flinched, and turned to see her new, unwelcome, companion leaning against the roof railing. "Either help, or go away," she ordered. 

The man looked at her, clearly amused and plucked her bag out of her hands. He gave her a shove towards the roof's access. "I'll buy you some time. Get going."

Janet glared at him over her shoulder, and started to run. Condescending ass. A useful condescending ass, but one all the same.

A few hours later, and Janet wasn't as surprised as she'd like when the door to her hotel room's balcony slid open and the man who had been watching her stepped inside.

"If it isn't my new stalker," Janet said dryly, barely glancing up from her maintenance work. The missed shot was-admittedly-mostly Janet's own fault, but it was nice to pretend mechanical errors might have played a part in it.

"Took me a little time to find you with only a description. Your name isn't actually Alice Mornings, is it?" he asked.

"No." She really should have threatened the hotel clerk more than she had if he was going to give out information that easily. "I'm not that much of an amateur."

He smiled at that. "Good. It doesn't suit you. What I should I call you?"

Janet gave him a narrow look. "Janet. You?"

"Slade. Nice job on the hit, Janie. Up until the actual shot."

"You think I don't know that?" Janet asked irritably. "I'm not _stupid_."

"Good. The man who taught you was at least a hundred pounds heavier than you, wasn't he?"

"That obvious?"

"Very." Slade leaned over her shoulder to watch her work. "Whoever taught you to shoot was either an idiot or wanted you dead."

"Or both. Mathews never was the brightest spark." Janet snorted, and shook her head. "Your point?"

"You've got talent. Hate to see that go to waste." He raised an eyebrow. "Don't think you'd like being dead, either."

"Is that an offer?" Janet asked steadily, trying to quell her rising hopes. Slade nodded, and offered her his hand. Janet considered it. She'd heard quite a few things about the man, growing up. Slade was ex-army, a mercenary, and not the sort of person a rookie CIA agent should be associating with. 

He was also her best bet at getting proper training on handling a gun, considering how serious her teachers at the agency _weren't_. They might be willing to hire a female agent, but teaching her was another thing, apparently.

Janet took his hand, and shook.


	2. Wintergreen

**From the Journal of W.R. Wintergreen, Major, British Army, Ret.'**

_...Janie has been a dear friend of both Slade and myself for over half a decade. She's the youngest of us three, a handful of years from thirty. Like Slade, she had her start in the employment of the United States government, the CIA to Slade's military. Like Slade, she is a prodigy, and was running field missions by the tender age of nineteen. What Adeline was to Slade, Slade is Janie. At times, I marvel at the course of events that brought her into Slade's life. It was only a few years past Adeline's departure, and at times, I feared for his life. He had become reckless, risking death for the flimsiest of reasons. There was little I could do to sway him._

_Then, one day, he returned, smiling, with a tiny girl trailing after him..._

"Wintergreen!" Slade called. "Some help, please?" It had Wintergreen jolting out of his chair and onto the porch in moments. Slade rarely asked for help.

"Slade, what in the world...?" Wintergreen asked. The tiny brunette limping behind Slade bristled, her black scowl growing blacker by the moment. 

"You never said anything about another person," she said, suspicion glittering in her ice-toned eyes. Her hand tightened around the shoulder strap of her outsized rifle, knuckles going white.

Slade clapped her on the shoulder. "Package deal, kid. Wintergreen, meet Janie. Janie, Wintergreen. Could you get her bag before her ankle snaps under the stress?"

_...And that was Janie. She was a bitter, brittle child. Unfamiliar with even the smallest of considerations, and blisteringly angry in an attempt to cover it. Desperate enough to follow Slade home on only the weight of his promise to **teach** her._

_She was barely half a decade older than Grant, and over a decade and a half younger than Slade. At times, she seemed even younger than that, her unfamiliarity with simple kindness making her seem oddly childlike. Other times, her resigned cynicism made her seem centuries too old for her youthful frame._

_I have never met a child more wrathfully mistrustful than Janie was. Through her eyes, the world was a darkly-lit place, an endless war just waiting for one to waver enough to be brought down._

_For a little over four years, she lived with us, learning the trade in-between field missions for her agency..._

"Adjust your footing," Slade ordered, nudging Janie's left foot with his own.

"Yes, sir," Janie said through gritted teeth, bracing the butt of her rifle against her shoulder once more. That was the seventh time in the last hour Slade had adjusted her footwork. It had been correct by the third.

Wintergreen recognized what Slade was doing. Addie had done the same to Slade when teaching him. He was trying to find her tipping point, see what she'd do when she hit her limit, and frustration overcame her rational mind. Wintergreen was impressed she hadn't cracked already.

"Footing," Slade said again. Janie let out a hissing breath.

" _Bullshit_. My footing is fine and we both know it."

Slade smiled goadingly at her. "Prove it."

Janie snarled in inarticulate frustration, lifted her rifle fluidly, and fired off a clip. The bullets impacted the target in a loose cluster a few inches from the center.

" _There_. Will you quit fucking with me and _teach me_ already?" Janie demanded.

Slade looked at her with approval. "Good girl. Don't put up with anyone pulling that sort of thing on you."

"Unless it's you?" Janie muttered, bowing her head to reload her rifle.

"Not even if it's me. Your time is valuable. Treat it that way." Slade ruffled her hair. "You're going to go far, kid."

Janie ducked away, not quite hiding her pleased smile. 

_...The responsibility was good for Slade. Janie drew Slade from his self-destructive spiral, and Slade taught Janie that other people could be trusted. They were each other's salvation._

***

Wintergreen woke up, the usual sounds of the Kenyan night disturbed by the uncharacteristic racket of Slade moving through the house.

"What on earth are you _doing_ , Slade?" Wintergreen asked, coming out of his room, blinking, to see Slade had spread half their vast armory over the living room. Slade was crouched in the center of the mess, packing away a relatively small portion of it into a black duffel bag.

"I need to be at the Kisumu railhead by dawn to catch the early train," Slade said, not looking up from his packing.

"That doesn't actually explain anything," Wintergreen said patiently, giving Slade a look he knew the younger man could feel.

Slade finally looked up at him, and there was panic darting behind his eyes. "Half an hour ago, Janie called. She's coming down. With her son."

"Something's wrong," Wintergreen said instantly. Janie was determined to keep her son out of the mercenary business. He and Slade didn't know anything about the boy, not even his name or face. Janie wouldn’t change her stance so suddenly. Not if she had any other options.

"Something is very wrong," Slade agreed grimly, and pulled his duffel onto his back. "I want to be there when they get into the Nairobi airport in case trouble followed her here."

"I'll bring the car around." It was a short walk to the garage, where the two jeeps were parked. It used to be one jeep, but then Janie happened. She was a menace behind the wheel. Despite the tension, Wintergreen found himself smiling. It was funny now, years removed from Janie’s wicked grin and leaden foot against the pedal. 

_...Janie has an ongoing love affair with all things blessed with engines. I suspect beneath the polished surface of her persona as emotionless, restrained special agent lurks a frustrated mechanic. She has been altogether too pleased with the many opportunities Slade has provided her to fiddle with vehicles for it to be mere professional interest. I live in fear of the day she manages to con her way to cockpit of a plane. All right thinking people should..._

***

A few hours later, and they were on the train to Nairobi. Even with the early hour, the train was crowded with people heading into the city, for work or for play. He and Slade weren’t the only white faces on the train, but nonetheless, they stuck out far too much for his, or Slade’s, comfort. Wintergreen found them an empty compartment, and secured the door against entrance with a sigh.

Slade sat for a brief moment and stood again, pacing in their compartment like a caged tiger. Wintergreen let him pace. Slade would say what was on his mind, sooner or later. He could afford to wait Slade out.

"Wintergreen..." Slade began, and trailed off.

"Yes?" Wintergreen asked, raising his eyebrows.

Slade firmed his jaw, looking obstinate. "Don't tell Janie about Grant. Whatever's going on, she has enough to worry about."

"And if she knew, maybe she wouldn't let you near her son?" Wintergreen fixed Slade with a look, gaze sharp enough to cut. _Don’t try to bullshit me, Slade,_ Wintergreen thought. 

Slade’s eyes dropped. "That has _nothing_ to do with it.”

Wintergreen sighed. _Toddlers._ Janie and Slade both. "Of course it doesn't."

"Wintergreen-" 

Wintergreen cut him off. "I won't say anything. For now. But if you haven't told her by the time they leave, I will." It was the best he could do. Janie would understand hesitance, but she’d never forgive secrets. _The two of them_ , Wintergreen grumbled mentally, _deserved each other_. 

Slade nodded reluctantly. "Fine."

The rest of the trip was spent in silence, each of them wrapped up in their own thoughts.

_...Janie has joked that Slade is to be her son's godfather, jokes I fear he takes all too seriously. Slade is not coping well with the death of his son Grant, and I worry he may become overly attached to this child in an attempt to cope. Or perhaps a refusal to cope._

_Oh lord, **Grant**. I remember him as a sullen, angry child, who both loved his father and hated him. He ran away when he was seventeen, to New York, and joined one of the local gangs. Grant and Janie were so very **similar**. Janie has largely grown out of her bitter rage, as Grant never did, but the parallels remain. Slade sees them even more sharply than I. For Janie and her son to be threatened so soon after Grant's death- I fear what Slade may feel driven to do keep them from a similar fate..._

Nairobi was a seething mass of humanity, streets jammed with cars, sidewalks filled with people. Slade’s stiff shoulders grew stiffer, and Wintergreen knew he was picturing all the ways such crowds could be used to hide an attack. 

Too many people, and Janie would know the threat they represented as well as Slade or Wintergreen did. To choose to come here despite that- Wintergreen worried about what sort of danger must be haunting Janie’s footsteps. 

They arrived at the airport in the early evening, escaping the heat, and took up watch by the terminal gates for the sight of their missing companion. Slade spotted her first, nudging Wintergreen to look. She was walking out of the nearest gate on the right, weighed down by a pink duffel bag over her shoulder, a gun case in one hand, and a small child balanced on her other arm.

"...remember what the rules are, darling?" Janie asked, looking down at her son with a soft, tender expression Wintergreen had never seen before.

"No last names, no places, no per...no _precise_ dates," the boy said, clinging to his mother's neck. 

Janie smiled, and kissed his forehead. "Good boy."

Wintergreen glanced at Slade, and muffled laughter. Slade looked like a flash-bomb had gone off in his face. Evidently, he had never thought of what Janie as a mother actually entailed.

"Janie!" Wintergreen called, waving over the crowd. Janie looked up, and her entire body went limp with relief.

"Wintergreen!" she shouted, and broke into a run, crossing the distance in moments. She dropped her gun case and hugged him tightly, never letting go of her son. "Oh, it's so good to see you."

“That serious,” Wintergreen said, embracing her in return. Janie nodded silently, clinging to Wintergreen. He stroked her back, feeling thin ridged scars across her shoulder blades that had never been there before. Anger sparked in his belly. 

“What happened, Janie?” he asked, and Janie shuddered, once.

“We’ll talk when my son isn’t listening,” she promised under her breath, and drew out of the embrace. She turned to Slade, who still looked faintly stunned.

"It's been a while, Janie,” he said, voice faint. Janie snickered, ducking her face to hide it in her son’s hair.

"It has," Janie agreed. She set down her son, who immediately hid behind her leg. At Janie’s coaxing, he peaked out shyly. "Slade, this is my boy Tim. Darling, this is your goddaddy Slade."

Tim's eyes went wide. "Hi," he whispered.

Slade crouched so he was on eye level, and held out his hand. "Hello, Tim. Nice to meet you."

"...you too." Tim edged out from behind Janie's leg, and cautiously took Slade's hand. Janie nodded, a satisfied expression coming to her face.

"Could you go take him to use the bathroom, Slade? It was a long flight," Janie asked, eying first her son and then Wintergreen. Slade nodded, receiving the message.

"No problem. That okay with you, kid?" Slade asked, leading him away into the crowd, Tim’s reply swallowed by the noise.

"What happened?" Wintergreen repeated, as soon as the pair was far enough away that the child wouldn't hear them.

“Are you asking about my scars or my son, Wintergreen?” Janie’s attempt at levity fell flat, and she sighed, wrapping her arms around her middle. “The scars are from my last assignment. Mexico. Things...went poorly.”

 _And please don’t make me think any more about it_ , Janie’s body language begged.

“And your son?” Wintergreen asked, allowing the topic to drop. 

Janie flashed him a grateful smile. "Someone tried to shoot my son and I while we were at home.” She shrugged her bony shoulders, voice forcibly nonchalant.

" _Hell_ ," Wintergreen swore, with almost religious fervor.

Janie snorted. "Yeah. Hell. I don't know who ID'd me, and I don't know how."

"We don't even know your civilian ID, Janie," Wintergreen said, unease growing. "And Slade's looked, often enough. How could somebody else manage it?"

"Exactly." Janie frowned, eyes going distant and expression going _mean_. Wintergreen almost felt sorry for whoever was responsible. "Two possible scenarios. A, somebody at the agency sold me out. B, somebody at the agency is _personally_ gunning for me."

Janie glanced about reflexively, doing a visual sweep of the crowded terminal. "Remind me to hurt Slade for snooping later, by the way."

"I'm sure you'll have your chance." Wintergreen gave her an amused look. "Janie, a question."

She cocked her head up at him. "Yes?"

"You're still using that?" Wintergreen asked, looking at the duffel. “I don’t think Slade would be offended if you discarded it.” Janie was not the sort of woman to have, let alone _use_ , a pink anything. She despised looking less then professional. Which was absolutely the reason Slade insisted on purchasing the bag for her. Neither of them could resist the chance to poke at one another.

Toddlers, both of them. 

"It's useful. And I'll be damned if I let Slade get that last word," Janie said, a look of distaste crossing her face. "Speaking of Slade..."

"I'm listening," Wintergreen said.

Janie's lips twitched, and then she sighed, exhaustion creeping onto her face. "My son doesn't know we're in danger, yet. I got us out before the bullets started really flying. I'd rather he not realize it at all. But if the worst happens-"

She broke off, and Wintergreen automatically lay his arm over her shoulders. Janie swallowed, balled her hands into fists, and continued. "-if the worst happens, and I die, I want you both to look after him." 

Wintergreen nodded gravely, aware of the magnitude of what she’d just entrusted him with. The life of her son, of Wintergreen’s all-but-grandson. "We will, Janie. I promise."

_...Janie is tragic in her courage. She isn't like Slade, who feels the need to tempt death and stare it down. But put her between it and something-or someone-she has chosen to protect, and she will stand immobile as a stone. For as long as I've known her, the trait has been native to her character._

_Janie has the unfortunate gift for pinpointing the worst case scenario with unerring accuracy. She sees the world as a series of catastrophes, narrowly avoided, and her death always lurks in her mind. Most of humanity has learned to put their death out of their thoughts. Even Slade does not live every moment conscious of his mortality._

_But Janie lives with her death wrapped around her shoulders, ever aware that there is no guarantee she will be alive beyond that moment. I am not sure if it is admiration or horror I feel when I think of it..._

By the time Slade and Tim returned, Janie had fixed her mask, no sign of the exhaustion or fear she'd revealed to Wintergreen visible on her face.

"So, I was thinking we'd take the train to Kisumu and stay there for the night before leaving for the house in the morning," Janie said briskly, dusting off her hands as if to brush away the previous subject. "Find a hotel, get some sleep, etcetera, etcetera." 

Slade looked at her with tolerant affection. "Control freak," Slade accused, fondness leaking out around the edges of his voice. Janie snorted, tossing her hair.

"Pot, meet kettle,” she said, lips twitching up into a smirk.

***

Early the next morning, Janie pulled the jeep around to the front of the hotel, Tabuk sniper rifle slung over her shoulder, Tim next to her on the passenger side. She timed it so she’d just pulled to a halt as Slade and Wintergreen were walking out the door. Wintergreen patted his pocket, not really surprised to find Janie had stolen the keys off him. She’d always shown an inclination for light fingers.

“You’ve improved,” he told her, leaning against the door. “When’d you take them?”

“Last night, right after dinner. I’ve been practicing.” She smiled girlishly at him, expression making her look years younger.

“I see that.” Wintergreen gave in to his urge to ruffle her hair, making Janie laugh and swat his hands away.

“The quicker we get to the house, the better. This is your chance to drive like the madwoman you are,” Slade told her, putting his bag into the back seat.

“I can always run you over, you know,” Janie told him, smirk tucking up a corner of her mouth. “Sneak up on your blindside.”

“With the roar of that engine? Keep dreaming, Janie,” Slade said, shaking his head. Tim clapped his hands over his mouth to keep from giggling.

“Behave, you two,” Wintergreen commanded jokingly, tossing his pack into the back of the jeep beside Slade’s baggage.

“Aww, but _daddy_ …” Janie snickered. Wintergreen swatted her lightly upside the head, doing his best to hide his pleased smile.

_...Janie and Slade are both similar in unexpected ways. Janie believes the world can be better, that hope is never lost. For all that she sees the worst cases so easily, she continues to believe that better outcomes are possible. And that she can act to make those better outcomes happen._

_Slade has a similar optimism, a conviction that even if he cannot see a way out of a situation, there must be one. They are oddities, Janie and Slade. The worst and the best of the world are equally clear to them, and is the ordinariness of what lies between the two that startles them..._

It took several minutes to finish loading the jeep up and get everyone inside-most of that time with Janie and Slade bickering quietly about the safest place to put her son. 

In the end, Wintergreen took the passenger seat, and Slade and Tim in the back with Slade charged with the boy’s care. The reminder of danger was sobering, and Tim, picking up on the atmosphere, was similarly quiet.

Half-way to the house, Slade stiffened. Janie, ever attentive to such cues, slammed on the breaks.

“An engine,” Slade said, eyes fixed on the sky. “Far off. Closing in. Take cover _now_ ,” Slade ordered.

Janie was already moving, her rifle tucked to her chest as she bailed from the jeep and headed for the treeline. Slade swung out of the jeep with Tim tucked against his chest, and Wintergreen took the opposite direction of Janie, trusting that she and Slade would cover their sides of the triangle.

Wintergreen stopped a distance from the jeep, concealed by the long grass, just in time to see it explode as high-caliber bullets impacted it, Slade dodging away. Wintergreen swore, jerking around to track the source, and swore again.

A helicopter. A Mil Mi-8 helicopter with ‘ **Fuerza Aérea Mexicana** ’ painted on the side. Someone had sent a helicopter-a Mexican _military_ helicopter, no less-to try to kill a mother and her five year old child. 

Wintergreen was starting to get irritated with Janie's attackers. 

Shots were fired at the helicopter from the treeline, covering Slade’s retreat. Janie. Wintergreen braced his shooting arm and took aim.

The helicopter swung away, and for a moment, Wintergreen thought they’d driven it off. Then the missiles were fired, taking out part of the treeline as it retreated. He cursed, and fired off his last bullets at the helicopter.

"Janie!" Slade shouted, racing towards growing flames, Tim clutching to his neck.

"Slade! Tim! Is my son okay?” Janie demanded, emerging a few feet from the burning patch of the treeline and rushing to their side. Tim hiccuped and started sobbing, clinging frantically to his mother.

"He's fine. Were you hurt?” Slade asked, and hugged Janie, a sick, startled look on his face.

"Not a scratch,” Janie promised him, clinging back just as tightly, her son caught between them. "Wintergreen?"

"Only the inevitable heart attack I'm going to have from this stress," Wintergreen grumbled.

_...That moment, that Slade thought Janie might have been injured, I think he realized how important she was to him. Until that moment, Slade had always kept Janie at a distance, however slight, not allowing her entirely into his heart. He treated her like a student and a dear friend, but nothing more._

_Ever after, though, Janie was his full partner, his equal in all things. If the man behind the attack had ever realized he was the one responsible for their partnership, he would drop dead from sheer force of his impotent rage. I take a large measure of amusement from the thought._


	3. Slade

Slade listened with half an ear to the sounds of Janie soothing her son into going to sleep.

"It’s grown-up business, darling. I know that accident was scary, but just let me worry about it. You just concentrate on being good," Janie said.

"Yes, momma," Tim said, sounding discontent.

"There's my boy. Sleep tight." Janie stepped out onto the porch, pulling the door shut behind her. She drew a hand over her face. "God help me. I don't know if I can do this."

"You'll have to settle for Wintergreen and me. God doesn't bother with people like us.”

"Shut up and pass me a beer." 

He tossed her one of the remaining beers, and smirked. "You are legal now, hopefully?"

Janie flipped him off, leaning on the porch railing. "Fuck you too, Slade. You took me out drinking for my twenty-first, and you know it."

"Are you sure about that? You're awfully short." He reached over and tugged a lock of her auburn hair. "Still."

Janie’s glare would impress a basilisk. "Die in a fire." A comfortable silence fell. Slade watched Janie, and saw Grant in the stiff lines of her shoulders, the lingering anger that could last for days. She resembled Grant in so many things...He shook the thought off. 

Janie rolled her beer bottle between her palms in fluid, absent-minded movements, eyes fixed on some far point off in the distance. "On the bright side,” she said after a long moment, “this does narrow down the suspect list quite a bit. I recognized that chopper. I was _meant_ to recognize it. There's no other reason for them to fly it here from goddamn Mexico. And there's only one possible source for that sort of power-play."

"Oh?" Slade asked, leaning on the porch railing beside her, beer in hand. "Who, and how do we kill them?"

"I was in Mexico two weeks back," Janie said. She winced, looking pained. "Going after a former informant who got cold feet. Miguel always was a cowardly piece of shit,” she said as an aside, scowling, and took a long pull from her beer.

“So you think he’s behind it?” Slade asked. Janie shook her head.

“He doesn’t have the balls for it. What I figure is, I was looking into the death of a DEA agent, Enrique Camarena, on the side. Kiki. He was a friend of mine, and we'd coordinated on a few operations before. Usually shared the same handlers for convenience when we did. Whoever betrayed him..."

Slade shut his eye as the implications of that came together. "...Probably betrayed you too. Please tell me you didn't make a drug lord angry."

"Félix Gallardo doesn't like me very much right now," Janie admitted. _Of course_ , Slade thought. El Padrino, head of the Guadalajara Cartel. The man who controlled all of the illegal drug trade in Mexico, and most of the corridors along the Mexican-American border that drug traffic traveled along. _The_ drug lord. 

"Always the worst of all possible options with you, Janie. I don't know why I expected different."

"Ever the optimist, Slade.”

“Compared to you, at least,” Slade said, and then, redirecting the conversation back to their original topic, “Who had access to your file?”

"Of the DEA?" Janie closed her eyes in thought, and ticked off a series of names. "Micheal Smithson, William Bean, and Andrew Lockheed. Smithson had been Kiki's handler for years, and Bean and Lockheed had been brought in for the operation that killed him."

"Can't necessarily rule out Smithson, but-"

"Let's start with the people who don't have a history with Kiki?" 

Slade nodded. "What do you know about Bean and Lockheed?"

"A few things." Janie looked up at Slade from the corner of her eye, smiling in a mockery of innocence. "I may have stolen their files after Kiki died."

"Good girl."  
***

After that, it was back to Kisumu's railhead, and from there, on to the Nairobi airport. Slade was traveling with Janie on to America. Wintergreen, meanwhile, had taken up the task of guarding Tim while they were away. 

He was staying in Nairobi for the time being, attempting to hide in plain sight. Nobody was happy with that option, but staying at the house, alone, without anywhere to hide but the Savannah around it should something go wrong was an even worse plan.

Janie had kissed her son goodbye, set her shoulders, and started walking. _Death moves among the people, and no one notices_ , Slade thought, torn between admiration and worry. Janie had many of the same flaws as Grant had. He could see her making the same mistakes as his son all too easily.

Grant, who had died. Slade suppressed a wince. Janie’s reaction to hearing of Grant’s death, so soon after her son’s own brush with mortality-little good could come of that.

"We should check out Bean first," Janie said to him as they waited to board the plane. "His personal finances are little excessive for a man making the salary he does."

Slade leaned in to examine the documents Janie had spread out in her lap. "Bribes, you think?"

"Most likely. If I find out he sold Kiki out for money, I'm ripping his fingernails off," Janie said darkly, prompting a few people around them to edge away.

"You’re being excessively bloody minded.” Slade placed his hand on Janie’s shoulder. “You know better than this.”

"My friend is dead and my son is in danger, what do you expect?" But Janie closed her eyes, acknowledging the implicit criticism, and started breathing in, out, in, the even pattern of meditation Slade had taught her years ago. 

The long plane ride passed quickly as they discussed possible courses of action. They got off at Washington, DC, Janie taking advantage of her CIA badge to head out while Slade was forced to deal with Customs. 

By the time he got through, Janie was waiting with a car right outside the airport, the contents of one of the weapon caches Slade had helped her set up hidden in the footwell of the back seats. 

“Lets get out of here,” Janie said, tone clipped. “It’s only a short drive to out first target.”

“You’re the expert,” Slade agreed. He knew Janie well enough to know that it’d do no good to criticize her when she was like this.

Barely twenty minutes passed before they pulled over and parked on a quiet suburban street. Janie reached into the back seat, pulling her duffel over her shoulder and foraging for something at the bottom of the pile from the cache.

“Ha! Found it,” Janie declared triumphantly, straightening up and passing him a blue nylon ditty bag. "Sniper rifle, semi-automatic, and handgun for me, another handgun, several sharp objects, and artillery for you.” She re-adjusted her hold on her pink duffel bag, which now had several long, thin objects pressing up against the side of it. An amused smile made its way across Slade’s face, without his permission.

Janie caught where Slade was looking. "Some day, I will have my revenge. The shiniest, most deadly efficient weapon I can get my hands on, in pink with purple sparkles. Just you wait. I'll make you _cry._ "

"You’re welcome to try," Slade said, falling into step beside her, shoulder to shoulder. "Bean lives where?"

"Three streets over, the house with red paint and white trim. Peaked roof. Nobody's home, and they have awful security." Janie grinned. "I have mentioned how much I enjoyed those breaking and entering lessons, right?"

Slade looked down at her, amused. "Only every time it comes up."

Janie blushed. “I plead the fifth.” Slade let the comment lie, pleased to see Janie moving past that dangerous anger. There was a youthful pleasure to what they were doing-planning a breaking and entering, and coordinating the most efficient way to ransack the house in the least amount of time.

Janie had always been a good student, and she was an excellent partner.

They circled around the back of the house, where the attached chimney made for a handy ramp up to the second story. Janie pulled herself onto the roof, her lighter weight allowing her to traipse across the poorly maintained roof without fear of it crumbling beneath her feet. She popped the screen off one of the windows, and jimmied it open. She turned and grinned at Slade, and slipped inside. Less than a minute later, and the backdoor of the house opened. Janie waved him in.

"You get the upstairs?" Slade confirmed. Janie nodded.

"Nothing up there but bedrooms and art." There was a wry twist to her mouth. "Art that is far out of his price range. _Something_ crooked is going down here."

Slade refrained from adding his own commentary on the inevitability of government corruption. Janie was occasionally touchy about her employers.

Wordlessly, they started searching the lower floor for anything potentially incriminating. Slade was in the living room when he heard Janie burst out into cackling laughter.

"Slade, you have to see this!" she said, waving him into the den. She held up a plastic bag, a file cabinet broken open at her feet. Slade stared at the contents of the bag.

"Is that...?"

"Cocaine?" Janie finished. "Yes, yes it is. Bean's been doing some business on the side."

Slade bit down on a smile. It wasn't that funny. Really. "That explains where his additional income is coming from, then."

He grabbed the remaining bags from the cabinet, and tossed a few to Janie. "I assume you're okay with confiscating these? We can burn them before we head back to Kenya."

"Oh, the poor little hypocrite," Janie said, voice dripping with sarcasm. "No, I'm fine with it."

They left the house, and rented a locker to hide the baggies in temporarily. "This is a bad idea, for the record," Janie pointed out. She didn't look too worried.

"If you've got a better idea, Janie-"

Janie's cellphone rang. She and Slade exchanged wary looks. The list of people who had the number was short. None of them could be calling with good news. Janie slowly pulled it from her bag and punched the answer button.

"Hello?" She said cautiously.

"Janie," Slade heard Wintergreen say, voice heavy. Janie paled.

"Something happened to my son," she whispered. "Didn't it?"

"Someone took him," Wintergreen confirmed. "Professionals. He was in the yard of the hotel, in the line of sight of at least thirty people, myself included. And then he was gone."

"I see," Janie said, voice brittle and unsteady. "Thank you for telling me." She hung up the phone, and looked at Slade. "I think I need to sit down."

Slade caught her around the waist, chill settling into his own veins. "We'll get him back," he promised. _Or die trying at least_ , Slade thought with grim humor.

Janie nodded, her face blanking. Retreating behind her wall of professional behavior. "We go and investigate the Lockheeds, and shake them until something turns up. Then we go get my son and kill everyone that was involved."

The Lockheeds lived in Washington, DC, too, in a large, three story house a block from the center of DC, in a gated community. Convenient. And possibly lifesaving, and Slade didn't mean for anybody on their side. Janie's temper was already tightly wound. Given time, it'd only become more explosive.

"Car's in the driveway," Janie said, eyes fixed on the house. "Somebody's home. Good. They can answer our questions."

"I'll go in first," Slade commanded. "You follow after ten minutes."

Janie nodded mulishly, beating out a pattern against her leg with her left hand. "I don't like it."

"You don't have to. Just obey me," Slade told her. He slipped across the street, and edged along the side of the house. A few moments of work had the back door open, and he stepped inside. There was a woman in the living room, back to Slade.

He knocked on the door frame. "Mrs. Lockheed, I presume?" 

The woman gasped, turning and going flat white at the sight of Slade

"Stay back!" Mrs. Lockheed ordered, voice rising. "I gave you what you wanted, didn't I? You swore you'd return my son! Where is he? Where is my son?"

Slade froze, mind racing. One child kidnapped, another child apparently missing... "I don't know what you're talking about. I'm not here about your son."

"But- you promised! I did what you asked!" Her face crumbled, despair overtaking her. "They're dead because of me, and you promised you'd return him."

"Perhaps if you explained-" Slade began, catching sight of movement in the hall mirror. He shifted subtly, seeing masked men edging into the house.

Mrs. Lockheed continued, unknowing. "The files, you promised me you'd give me Jacob back if I got you my husband's files. Where is my son?" 

Slade ignored her and struck, hitting one man's solar plexus, then sending him careening back into his fellows, and took out another with a toss of his sword. Mrs. Lockheed screamed. Slade turned, seeing the gunman who had wrapped his arm around her neck.

"Freeze," the man ordered Slade. "And Mrs. Lockheed- move. My boss has decided we're re-negotiating."

He obviously didn't know Slade very well. More proof that this was about Jane the CIA Agent, not Janie, Slade's student.

Slade pursued them as the man dragged Mrs. Lockheed up the stairs. Another masked man opened fire. Slade cursed and dove behind a free standing couch, firing back as he did. He took the man out. But not without taking a bullet to the leg. Slade tore off a strip of cloth and started bandaging the hole. 

From behind him came the sound of yet another man's laughter. Slade cursed internally.

"Nasty shot," the man said, pointing a gun at Slade. "It'll stop you from fighting back. Or escaping. Good."

"Not for you." The was the bone jarring thump of metal impacting a man's skull, and the man collapsed. Looking up, he saw Janie standing over the unconscious body of his last attacker. She grinned ferally when she saw Slade looking.

"I said I'd let you handle this, but I saw them come in after you," Janie said, and knelt to secure their new prisoner to the stair rails. "Any idea who they are?"

"I don't know," Slade said grimly. "I thought they might have been more of Mrs. Lockheed's guards, or more of the same from Kenya. But their target was definitely her." He finished tying bandaging around his injured thigh, and stood, ignoring the way his vision hazed at the abrupt shift. He gritted his teeth, and started up the stairs.

Janie raised a hand in protest. "What about your leg?"

"Don't worry yourself," Slade said, something cold settling over him. Children. Two children now had been endangered so far. Janie’s anger was all too understandable.

"Like _hell,_ " he heard Janie say from behind him. "You're a stubborn fool, Slade. The only reason I won't call you a complete one is because you're missing a few pieces," she told him as caught up to him on the stairs, and forced him to wrap an arm around her shoulder.

"And you're a nosy busy-body, so we're even." Janie made an obscene hand gesture at him, and scanned the upper floor, examining it with a sniper's experienced gaze.

"Last door on the left, do you think?" she asked, something hard and dark glinting in her eyes. Slade nodded. They advanced carefully, edging along the wall. Janie took position on the other side of the door, and forced it open with a solid kick.

Bullets flew. Janie and Slade both threw themselves backward, out of the line of fire. Janie leveled her gun, and Slade raised his own, fingers on the trigger.

"Put the weapons down, or she's history," Mrs. Lockheed's captor said, pointing a gun at her temple.

"Please...do what he says." Mrs. Lockheed begged.

"I mean it. Put it down or I'll kill her!" the man shouted. Slade slowly lowered his weapon, crouched a few feet to the left of the unknown man. Janie snarled under her breath, but she let her hands drop.

"Good. You just saved her life." The man turned his gun from Mrs. Lockheed to Slade.

"Her life..." Slade said, trailing off, as Janie fired. A perfect head shot. He smiled proudly beneath his mask. "But not your own. Nice shot, Janie."

"I live to please," Janie said, voice cool.

Mrs. Lockheed looked at both of them, hysteria bubbling in her eyes. "You killed him?"

"Would you prefer she let him kill you?" Slade asked. Mrs. Lockheed shook her head, looking overwhelmed.

"No...no," she said, hugging herself. "Thank you- both of you. Please...can you help me get my baby back?"

Janie approached, slinging her rifle over one shoulder."My boy is missing because of you," she said, voice frost-edged and unfriendly. "They took him because you sold. Me. _Out_. Why should we help a traitor?"

"Please! Jacob must be so scared," Mrs. Lockheed begged. Slade gave Janie a sharp look. She scowled blackly, and huffed.

"Fine. No reason to make your son suffer because you're a spineless coward," Janie allowed, crossing her arms. " _Talk_. Who did you tell, when, and how much?"

Slade turned, and left Janie to interrogate Mrs. Lockheed, and moved on to examine the home office they'd passed on their way up. He rifled through the filing cabinet until he came across a file folder labeled 'Mexico/1985/ Enrique Camarena,' and tucked it under one arm. 

He returned to the other room, where Janie was pacing in agitation, and Mrs. Lockheed was sitting on the ground, crying softly.Janie jerked her head at Slade. "Come on. Let's get out of here. We've got a date in Mexico City."  
***

It took three days of staking out the shanty town on the outskirts of the west side of Mexico City to narrow down their target to a large complex of interconnected shacks, lean-tos, and other bits of amateur construction, and another two to determine the guards’ schedules. By the end of the five days, Janie was vibrating with tension.

"Ideally, we get in, get both children, and get out without being noticed," Slade said, eying the poorly lit, rambling, patchwork structure. Navigating inside would be difficult.

"Followed by wreaking a swift and bloody vengeance," Janie said, eyes flinty. Her usual rifle had been discarded in favor of a P90, and the look on her face would terrify a lesser man. Slade was as proud as he was worried.

"Exactly." Slade rose to his feet. "Shift change at ten, two and six. Guards check in via radio every fifteen minutes."

"We go in at the two a.m. shift change," Janie said, slotting away extra clips of ammunition in her belt and pockets. "When they'll be tired. Right after the first check in. The children should be somewhere near the center of the compound, if the pattern with El Padrino's other bases holds here."

Slade nodded. The wait for night to fall, if possible, wound Janie up even more than the preceding five days. By the time the second shift changed over, and the first check in was completed, she was tense as a wire.

As soon as the two guards set down their walkie-talkies, Janie let out an explosive breath. "Go, go, go," she hissed, already moving. Slade slid behind one of guards, and snapped his neck with a sharp, efficient twist. He eased the body to the ground. Turning, he saw Janie take down her own guard, knife sliding in between the fourth and fifth vertebra of his neck. She caught the body at the last second, lowering it down carefully to prevent any noise.

She and Slade exchanged looks. She jerked her head toward the left-hand hallway, raising her eyebrows. Slade nodded, and raised his hand, flashing five fingers twice in quick succession. Janie smiled crookedly and saluted, turning to her hallway. Slade started walking down the right-hand path.

He scouted up ahead approximately thirty yards, checking the side rooms and watching the walls and ceiling for cameras. At the early hour, nobody was awake yet, leaving the compound eerily empty. Slade gave the hall ahead a visual sweep, and doubled back to meet Janie.

"Anything on your end?" Janie asked, voice hushed.

Slade shook his head. "What about you?"

"Guard about fifty yards up. Asleep."

"Think it's a trap?" Slade asked dryly. Janie smirked, letting out a soundless laugh.

"Of course. And you know my policy on traps."

"Walk in and get yourself half-killed," Slade added under his breath. Janie rolled her eyes, and ignored him.

"I'm going in. You with me?" she asked.

"Somebody has to keep you from dying," Slade said.

"Jackass," Janie muttered. They both lifted their guns into ready position and slowly advanced down the poorly lit hallway, until the guard was in sight.

Janie struck, knife tearing through the guard's throat, opening the vein. The strike was quick, messy, and violent. Unnecessarily so. Janie scowled, likely sensing the direction his thoughts had gone.

"He's one of the people who tried to harm my son," Janie said stiffly, voice pitched low. "A kidnapper at best, a murderer at worst."

"There's still a line," Slade said back, just as quiet. Janie huffed, glaring darkly for a moment before forcing her face blank.

“What if it was Joey, Slade?” she asked, tension twisting across her shoulders. “What if it was Grant?”

Slade winced, and Janie’s eyes went narrow. “What aren’t you telling me, Slade?”

“Grant’s dead,” Slade said quietly. “He died a few days before you called.”

“Then how can you _possibly_ -”

"Because he's dead, and I can't change that," Slade said, the words tearing at his throat.

Janie pinned him with a challenging stare. "And if his killers were alive?"

"Some of them are," Slade admitted. "How many people should I have killed, Janie? How complicit is too much? Should I have razed the entire organization to the ground?"

Janie flinched.

Slade shook his head “We can discuss it later, rescue now.” 

She grimaced and nodded, approaching the door. Slade took the other side. “On three.”

“Two, one.” Slade kicked the door in.

Silence. The room was large, and dark, corners shadowed. Janie reholstered her gun.

“Tim? Darling, are you in here?” Janie called, voice going sweet, meant to soothe. The transition was disturbing, more so for the anger Slade could still see in the back of her eyes.

"Momma!" Tim burst from a far corner, throwing himself at Janie. She caught him with a single arm, dropping to the floor and hugging him tightly.

"Timothy," Janie said, voice shaking as tension seeped from her shoulders. "Thank god. I was so worried. Did they hurt you?"

"No," Tim said, shaking his head and clinging to his mother's shirt. "Not me." Janie exchanged a look with Slade over the top of her son's head. Foreboding started to creep over him. Not _Tim_.

"Tim, was there another boy with you?" Slade asked, voice carefully calm and even. Tim hid his face in the crook of Janie's shoulder, breaking out into fresh sniffles.

"Used to be," he said, so softly Slade barely heard it. He went cold.

"Fuck," Janie said, stark and eloquent as always.

"Get him out of here," Slade said urgently, the hair on the back of his neck prickling. " _Now._ "

A voice came from the shadows. "Neither of you are going anywhere. Drop your weapons." Slade stiffened, twisting to see the silhouette of a man, backlit by the now open doorway.

"He's pointing a gun at me, isn't he," Janie sighed, shoulders slumping. Slade didn't answer. He couldn't. His vision had narrowed to the man aiming at Janie. Such an unremarkable man, nothing about him to catch anyone's attention. The sort of bland, dismissible man he'd heard Addie describe as having 'face-shaped faces'.

A minion, in other words. People with power wore it like a cloak they never took off. They couldn't be unremarkable if they tried.

“Now!” the man barked. Janie shrugged off her holster and slowly set her knives on the ground. She caught Slade’s eye, and mouthed ‘go with it’. Reluctantly, Slade did, disarming himself.

“Good. Now. Hands in the air, both of you,” The man ordered. Slade could see the dark look that flashed across Janie’s face before it smoothed back into a bland neutrality. Slade winced. _Oh, hell._

“And my son?” Janie asked, voice stripped of any danger, carefully meek and unthreatening. Slade went tense, suspicion confirmed. No possible good could come of that voice. He could count the number of times it had _not_ proceeded bloody violence on one hand.

The man made a sound of aggravation. “Pick the brat up, other hand in the air. Just get moving.”

“Of course,” Janie said in that same blank voice, cupping the back of her son’s head briefly before lifting him into her arms. Tim wrapped his arms around Janie’s neck, going still and tense against her shoulder, hiding his face in her neck. She lifted her remaining hand into the air, and nodded to Slade.

 _You go first._ Slade met her eyes, flashed through a series of short, discreet hand signs, and started walking. Janie better know what she was doing, because right now, Slade was flying blind.   
***

They were led into a small office, dominated by a large desk, the tall, grey-eyed man seated behind it and the oversized gun he had a few centimeters from his hand. 

Slade could see the contempt flash through Janie’s eyes before she could muffle it. “Miguel, you piece of shit,” Janie said, so pleasantly it even took Slade a moment to realize what she’d just said. Miguel, the informant who’d quit passing information?

“Jane. Or should I be calling you Janet?” Miguel responded, in equally venom drenched cheer.

“Alec, you can go. This is private business.” The minion nodded, and left the room. Leaving just them and Janie’s treacherous informant.

“You can call me Agent Finch, thanks _ever so_ ,” Janet said, setting her son down and giving him a little push towards Slade. “What did you do with Jacob?”

Miguel gave Janie a look of condescending amusement. “Come now, _Agent Finch_ , surely you can figure that out yourself. I’ll give you hint: It’s the same thing I intend to do the you and your son.”

Janie twitched. “Where’s the boy’s body?” 

“And why should I tell you anything?” Miguel shot back, leaning back in his chair. The very image of a man secure in his power.

Janie lunged, grabbing the gun up off the desk, and pointed it at him. “I’ll ask you one more time. Where. is. the. body?” Miguel looked at the gun in disbelief, as if not quite understanding what had happened.

“You think I’ll really-”

Janie pulled the trigger. The bullet struck neatly, square with Miguel’s throat. His eyes went wide, hand jerking to his throat, before his body slowly toppled from the chair onto the office floor.

“Good riddance,” Janie said. She glared down and then struck out, her boot impacting the corpse’s ribs. And again, sudden fury sweeping over her like a summer storm. “Burn in _hell_ , bastard.”

Tim whimpered, hiding behind Slade’s leg. “Momma...”

“Come on, Janie, it’s done. Let it go.” Slade told her, and held out his hand.

Janie tensed, and turned halfway away from the corpse, struggle evident on her face. “He hurt my _son_ , Slade. He _killed_ a boy my son’s age.”

“And he’s dead now. Your son needs you.” The tension in her shoulders wound tighter. Tim, still clinging to Slade’s leg, looked up at Janie.

“Momma, please,” Tim said, voice raw with childish fear. 

Janie let out a single, half-strangled gasp, and took Slade’s hand. He pulled her against himself, tucking Janie’s head beneath his chin. “Shh, shh. You did good, kid. It’s okay. We’re all alive. You can breathe.”  
***

“Mrs. Lockheed,” Slade said, “I’ve got some bad news about your son.”

Mrs. Lockheed went pale. She gasped, shaking her head. “No, no, god, please-”

“I’m sorry, Jacob...he was dead by the time we got there,” Janie told her, stiff and obviously uncomfortable with her role as deliverer of bad news. “His body-” she cut herself off.

Mrs. Lockheed’s furious, grief-stricken accusations followed them out of the house- ‘ _You’re_ _the reason Jacob is dead! You killed my son!’_

“This isn’t the end of it, you know,” Janie said, once they returned to the van, breaking the silence that had fallen. Her voice was pitched soft enough not to wake her son, asleep in the back seat.

"The information is still out there now. Someday, someone's going to come after me again."

“We can work on putting ‘someday’ off for as long as possible, though,” Slade told her. Janie’s mouth quirked up into a small smile.

“True enough.” She tilted her head towards Slade. “I’ve got to get Tim home now, and then...”  
She trailed off, and Slade raised an eyebrow. “And?”

"And then there’s something I need to do.” Slade wasn’t surprised when Janie disappeared within a few hours. She’d never been one to dawdle. 

It took until Christmas for her to get back in contact with Slade and Wintergreen again. When she did, there were shadows behind her eyes that hadn't been there before.

"I'm not working for the CIA anymore," she told Slade, hand creeping up to a new burn scar that crept under the hairline of her newly short cropped hair . "Do you need a field partner?"

"It'd be great to have you." Slade clasped Janie's hand. "Welcome aboard."  
***

They had nearly a decade, before Janie's prediction came true, and her past caught up to haunt her. Somebody had finally gotten their hands on El Padrino's personal papers, and Janie's name was one of the many secrets hidden among them. After that, it was only a matter of time before the information made it into the hands of one of her enemies.

The first warning Slade got was the desperate phone call from Janie.

"I need you to do me a favor, Slade," she told him as soon as he picked up. Her voice was raw and rag edged, words bitten off, and Slade could hear the sounds of her pacing, heels beating a pattern against the floor in the background.

"What's the situation, Janie?" Slade asked, mind turning over one terrible scenario after another.

"A hit's been put on my civilian identity. I need to fake my death." Click, click, click went Janie's high heels against the wooden floor. "Soon. Before they start targeting my husband and Tim."

"What do you need?" Slade asked, already surveying his armory. Janie sighed raggedly.

"I've got a contact who'll help me. Dieumene, the obeah man. He works out of Haiti." Muffled thumps sounded at Janie's end, and she swore. "I don't have much time, listen carefully, okay?"

"I'm listening,” Slade said, helplessness gnawing at him.

"I and my husband are traveling to Haiti in August. Dieumene will be arranging for a false abduction from there. I'll need somebody to pick me up after I'm 'killed.'" A harsh burst of static.

"I've got to go. I'll send you the details soon. Will you help?"

"Yes. Janie, are you in danger right now?" Slade asked urgently.

Janie bit off a harsh laugh. "Deadly. I'll be okay. I only need to keep running for a few more months. The CIA's promised my son and husband protection if I go back to working for them, but I don't trust them to handle this."

Slade closed his eyes. Janie was doing her best to hide it, but he could hear the panic and rage bubbling behind her steady voice. They had her backed into a corner.

"I'll be in contact. Stay safe, Janie."

"You too, Slade. I'll call as soon as everything's settled."


	4. Epilogue: Janet

**Five Years Later:**

Janet’s hands tightened around the photograph. “This is my target?”

“Yes. Is there a problem?” the director asked, voice dismissive. Janet pictured herself driving an icepick through his eye. Enough force to pierce through the eye, into the brain. A quarter turn just to be safe. Messy, painful, and quick. Better than he deserved.

“Timothy Wayne. You want me to kill the adopted son of one of the richest men on the east coast.” You want me to kill _my_ son. Janet set the photo on the desk to keep from tearing it. Her hand dropped automatically to her side, feeling the grip of her favorite handgun at her hip.

“His name has come up in some troubling contexts. The guys upstairs want him gone to be safe.” The director said in his bland, emotionless politician’s voice. _Stupid young fuck_ , Janet thought viciously, _barely a day over thirty._ Looking at Janet like she was the weak one in the room, not this child who’d never raised his hand in violence.

Spoiled little daddy’s boy, promoted to a position he had no right to be in by his doting father. Nepotism at its finest. Thought his last name was all the qualification he could ever need. Stupid fool, who never looked deeper, never thought about the wider circumstances. Who had, so obviously, neglected to read Janet's file. Because how could Janet Gray have anything interesting in her past?

“We don’t kill people just to be ‘safe.'” Janet’s voice was frosty.

“Things change,” the director said shrugging. Janet glanced over her shoulder to the closed door.

“Yes,” she said, “They certainly do.” Five minutes later, she exited the director’s office unhurriedly, her son’s file in hand. She had a few minutes before the director’s body was discovered. She hummed a few bars of the Star-Spangled Banner as she walked.

So. She was approximately fifteen minutes away from being declared a traitor to the nation. Her son was going to be the target of other assassins. Time to get to work.

Out the agency doors, into the crowds of Washington, DC. Janet picked the pocket of an unwary tourist and stole his phone. Dialed the number that her old friend had promised her would always be active.

“Hello, Slade. I’ve got a bit of a problem…”

"What's wrong?" Slade's voice was comfortingly unchanged.

"I just killed the director of field operations," Janet said, stopping three quarters along a bridge and shrugging off her sober blue coat. She leaned on the railing, dangling the coat over the edge, and let it slip from her fingers

"Any particular reason why?" Slade asked. Janet could just see the slow upward creep of his eyebrows.

"I was assigned to kill my son."

There was startled laughter on the other end of the line. "It's never a small problem with you, is it Janie?"

"You wouldn't love me if it were any different." Janet hummed cheerfully. "Your contacts are better than mine, at this point. Know anybody who could get me to Gotham quickly?"

"I can think of a few. Head for the subways. Third stop on the red line. There's a locker there, three sixty one, that has a rifle and a few other things you might find useful," Slade told her. "The standard combo."

"You set that locker up in case something like this happened, didn't you?" Janet asked, shaking her head at Slade's sentimentality.

"Possibly," Slade said, tone enigmatic. "I'll send someone to meet you there."

Janet nodded automatically. "Thanks, Slade."

"Any time, Janie. Stay safe."

"I will." Janet snapped the phone in two, and dropped the pieces into the river after her jacket. Hopefully, the poor idiot she'd stolen it from wouldn't be hassled too much. She started walking again, heading for the subway. Time to make trouble.

A smile crept across Janet's face. She’d missed going freelance.

***

Slade's contact was a tall, muscular woman with short-cropped blonde hair and eyes nearly as pale as Janet's own. She was waiting by the locker bank, a small bracelet of blue and orange cloth discreetly advertising her connection to Slade. Janet nodded to her, spinning the lock on locker three sixty one. The locker fell open obligingly, revealing a duffel bag crammed inside.

The duffel was pink. Janet shook her head. _Slade_.

"So you're the legendary Janie, huh?" Slade's contact asked, holding her hand out to Janet. Janet could feel her calluses when they shook. Rifle trained, but not as a sniper. Not like Janet. Good- Janet was honest enough to admit to being a jealous bitch when it suited her, and _she_ was the only sniper allowed in Slade's life.

Janet pulled the duffel free of the locker and closed the door. "Apparently. And you are?"

"Pat. Slade trained me too." The side of Pat's mouth curled up. "Tell me, was he as much of an overprotective control freak when he taught you as he is now?"

Janet grinned, and leaned against the locker bank. "He _tried_ to be. But I got myself into enough trouble on my own that he gave up on pushing me away."

Pat let out a low, impressed whistle. "What did you do?"

"I made a Mexican drug lord very, very unhappy." Janet sighed, shaking her head. "I was a dumb brat in my twenties."

"Weren't we all?" Pat wrapped her arm around Janet's shoulders. "Come on, let's get you to Gotham. Once you've got things sorted out there, I'll buy you a beer. We can swap stories. I bet you have some that could make hair curl."

"It's Slade. Of course I've got stories. It's a date." A few hours later, Janet bid Pat goodbye, phone numbers exchanged and plans to meet made. Gotham's streets were as busy as ever, and the skies above as gray. Janet smiled, a cheerful bounce to her step.

"Good to see you, Slade," Janet greeted, bumping her shoulder against his as they moved down the street.

"You too. Do you have some sort of goal to date all the same women I have?" Slade asked, ushering her inside a tiny hotel room.

Janet cocked her head up at him, grinning. "Not my fault you have good taste and bad luck, Slade." She stood on her tiptoes to kiss him, wrapping her arms around his neck. Slade put his arm around her waist, hand at the small of her back, steadying her, and kissed back.

"I've missed you, Janie," Slade said when they finally broke the kiss. They didn't pull apart, Slade's arms around Janet's waist and back, Janet's around his neck.

"It's been far too long," Janet agreed. She sighed, and stepped back. "We need to plan."

"Why is the agency targeting your son in the first place?" Slade asked, sitting down at the rickety table. Janet pushed her son's file at him.

"His name has come up in 'troubling contexts'. As if that isn't true of everybody from Gotham with more than two dimes to rub together," Janet said darkly.

Slade opened the file, and blanched. "Your son is Tim _Drake_?"

Janet's eyes narrowed. "Slade, why, exactly, do you recognize my son's name?"

Slade hesitated. "You're not going to like it."

"I _already_ don't like it. Tell me."

"Your son was Robin. Red Robin these days, from what I've heard."

"You're right. I don't like it. Who's responsible?" Janet asked, scooping up a handgun off the table.

"Common consensus is Batman, though I've heard it was originally Nightwing's idea- _and don't you think vengeance should wait until he's safe?"_

Janet stopped halfway to the door. "Fine," she said at last. "For now."

Slade stared at her, and laughed. "Suddenly so much makes sense now. Of course he's your son."

"Don't think you're getting away with not explaining that comment," Janet said automatically. She sat down on the bed, and stared blankly at the wall.

Her son was Robin. Her mind flashed to every news report, confidential document, and bit of idle gossip she'd ever heard or seen on the topic. The rumors of near deaths and narrow escapes, and disasters barely averted. Tim had been in the middle of all of that. Her _son._

All these years, she'd let the agency keep her away from her son, been their faithful monster so that Tim would be safe. And for all of it, Tim had been going out and risking his life.

Vigilantes _died._ Everyone knew that.

She should have been there. She should have been the one to teach him to throw a punch, dodge bullets, stitch shut torn skin. She should have been there for his first night out, and the first time he lost somebody.

All this time, and Tim was just like her. And she'd never known.

"He could have died," Janet said, horrified, putting together the implications. "He could have died and I'd never have known how, or why."

Slade sat down on the bed beside her. "But he didn't. Breathe, Janie."

"Breathing." Janet stretched her hands to full extension, and then balled them into fists. "So. Upcoming assassination attempt to avert, re-entry into my son's life to plan, dozens of super villains to threaten with bloody murder."

"That's the spirit," Slade said, tone dry. Janet snickered.

"Love you too, Slade," Janet said. She sobered, and looked him in the eye. "Tell me everything you know about what my son's been doing for the past five years."

***

Janet crouched on the rooftop, Slade beside her. She hadn’t planned for this. Her first thought, her only thought, had been to get to her son before another agent could. The actual issue of keeping him alive and getting the kill order pulled remained. As well as the issue of her son’s vigilante activities. 

Janet felt a great deal of unwilling pride over her son’s accomplishments. Tim had gotten involved with the League of Assassins, and come out on top. Had participated in the tournament of assassins and survived. Taken down the Council of Spiders, crippling the League in the process. Destroyed the Unternet.

He’d grown into such a talented young man.

But today, her son was giving a speech on his 'Neon Knights' organization. Today, a man with a gun was going to try and kill him. Today, Janet was the only thing standing between her son and a homicide attempt.

This was what she was trained for. Her son was a vigilante, and apparently quite a good one. But Janet was a sniper, and she was one of the best on the planet. This was what _she_ had made of herself and her life. A sniper with her rifle, her spotter beside her. And before her, her target. The man gunning for her son. The first of many. Janet almost pitied them.

Janet pulled the trigger, and watched the bullet spiral. It impacted neatly, perfectly, with the base of his skull. His body jerked, and fell, prompting screams. Janet smiled, all teeth and cruelty.

"Let the games begin, boys. _Nobody_ hurts my son."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be continued in 'Family Traditions'


End file.
